


Leaves Fall, and so Does Michael

by strawberrylemonade1225



Category: Be More Chill - Iconis/Tracz
Genre: Autumn, Fluff, M/M, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-02
Updated: 2017-11-02
Packaged: 2019-01-28 07:48:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,265
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12601740
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/strawberrylemonade1225/pseuds/strawberrylemonade1225
Summary: Is Michael gay for fall or Jake Dillinger? Actually, is he more gay for fall or for Jake Dillinger, 'cause let's face it: he's gay for both.





	Leaves Fall, and so Does Michael

**Author's Note:**

  * For [questionabletendencies](https://archiveofourown.org/users/questionabletendencies/gifts).



If you were to ask Michael who he thought he would love when he got older, he’d probably just say his mom. Honest to God, this kid was convinced that he wasn’t ever going to fall in love with anyone; it was too cliche, too… not him. Besides, it’d take a long time for him to even  _ begin  _ to fall in love with said person, and by that time, they’d probably leave him.

Well… was he  _ wrong. _

Looking at the boy now, talking with his thumb hooked in the belt loop on his jeans. An easygoing grin blesses his face, colorful leaves cascading around him. The rain of red, orange, yellow, and brown mix well with the boys color-scheme; red jacket, brown hair, blue jeans, red shoes. Michael feels his heart flutter in his chest, surely looking at him with heart eyes by this point.

Michael completely forgets the fact that he’s sitting on a bench outside during lunch as he watches the boy. Jeremy nudges his side, catching his attention, making Michael jump and turn to face him.

“Y-Yeah, Jeremy?” Michael asks, trying to sound like he wasn’t just caught staring lovingly at Jake Dillinger. Jeremy sees through him, though, smirking and poking his arm.

“Michael’s got a crush,” he jokes, poking his arm harder and Michael’s face flares up, smacking at him until Jeremy pulls away, cackling behind his hand. Michael looks down at his lap with a face surely as red as his hoodie.

“Like my crush means anything,” he mutters, kicking at a pile of leaves with his foot. “I just kinda… slid into the group after… all the shit. What if he thinks I’m annoying?”

“Jake? Thinking  _ you’re _ annoying? Michael,  _ please, _ ” Jeremy reassures, and Michael looks over at him with a confused expression. Jeremy must be able to tell, because he continues. “Just ask Rich. He told me he saw Jake writing- well, trying to write a letter to you. He didn’t see what it was about, just your name at the top.”

“Shut the  _ hell _ up, that’s such a lie-”

“Bet-”

“Bets? What’s the bet?” Jake suddenly intervenes, standing in front of the bench with that grin still plastered on his face. Michael’s mouth goes dry and he just stares at him with wide eyes. He’s also pretty sure his glasses are crooked.

Jeremy sees the helpless state his friend is in, so he answers for him. “We’re betting to see which one of us can convince Rich to jump in a leaf pile first.”   


“Oh! I bet I can; I’ll go get him!” Jake exclaims, dumping his bag on the bench and running off. When he’s out of sight, Michael deflates, burying his face in his hands, heart still pounding in his chest and face incredibly red. Jeremy laughs from beside him, and if they weren’t best friends, Michael would seriously consider clobbering the kid.

“And you thought  _ I  _ was bad.”

“Shut your mouth.”   


***

A short and vague list on what Michael loves-

  * His friends
  * Video games
  * Music
  * His mom
  * Fall
  * Jake Dillinger
  * Weed



Let’s highlight “Fall” and “Jake Dillinger” for a second.

Jake is basically fall personified, Michael has come to learn.

With fall comes Michael’s favorite drinks from coffee shops. Pumpkin spice  _ everything _ . The coffee warms him up, filling up his empty stomach and spreading warmth throughout his chest and stomach, making him smile and feel… comforted, for some reason. The drink put him in a festive mood, and while a flavour of coffee can’t exactly cure all your problems, it sure can make him happier at the moment and time that he has his cold hands wrapped around the steaming cup.

It’s October in senior year, marking him and Jake as friends for about nine months now. In those nine months, Michael has learned that Jake is a touchy person.

A…  _ very  _ touchy person. It’s actually driving Michael insane.

A hug from Jake pretty much always tended to make Michael’s day a little bit better, a little bit brighter. Whether it be a casual arm slung around his shoulders, pulling him close as they walked, or a full on hug when they see each other, it made Michael’s heart leap into his throat and made his knees weak, and he could never get over it. He didn’t  _ want  _ to get over it.

Right, back to fall.

The rain is amazing. Yeah, it makes the leaves soggy and kind of gross, and Michael has to break out his Spongebob umbrella from fourth grade, but the  _ sound. _ On the rare occasions that he’s home and not blasting music through his headphones and it rains, Michael likes to slide open his window and push his desk chair next to it so that he can sit by and just watch the rain pour, pattering soothingly on the rooftop. Cracking open a book, he becomes an autumn cliche, completely and utterly calm.

Jake, apparently, is very good at calming people down. Michael doesn't know why that realization is as shocking as it is, but he just never really expected it out of someone who once bullied him.

(Jake apologized profusely for everything mean that he had done to Michael and Jeremy and pretty much anyone else involved. That was the beginnings of Michael's heart speeding up uncomfortably around him.)

Michael would be on the verge of a breakdown, stumbling for some way to keep his grip on reality, and Jake would notice. Jake would notice, and he would talk to him calmly and sweetly. He'd relate to him, telling Michael that he knew what he was going through, and that he would be sure to help him through it.

Jake's voice was like honey and chocolate, words flowing out like water, calming the rapid pitter-pattering of his heart. He would lower his voice a little bit, words specifically directed towards Michael, and Michael swore that he could be lulled to sleep just by listening to it. If Jake's voice had a color, it would be a mixture of soft purples and blues, with-

Tone down the gay for one second, Michael.

Moving on with fall, he loves the colors that are brought out, dulling out the bright greens of summer and replacing New Jersey with orange and yellow and red, shining prettily in the sunlight. Everyone gets so hyped up about “winter wonderlands”, but call Michael up when it snows more than four inches of mushy snow that glitters. He'd stick with his autumn beauty, what, with the leaves and decorations and wind that ruffles the trees.

Speaking of beauty, Jake had to be some type of illegal.

Michael's chilling outside before school one day, sitting on the benches and waiting for Jeremy or Brooke to show up, when neither of those people arrive.

No, instead, Jake arrives. 

He walks up to the bench and smiles wide when he sees Michael, and Michael's heart goes haywire.

The bench section is shaded, but Jake is standing right in the middle of the beginning shade, half his face in shadow, and the other half glittering in the sun light. His blue eyes shine, no matter whether in the light or not, and the easy going vibe to him immediately makes Michael feel comfortable while also nervous.

Michael jumps to his feet, shakily taking off his headphones and dropping them around his neck. He smiles nervously while looking up (Up! Looking up!) at Jake, who's smiling at him.

Mentally preparing himself for it, Michael easily leans into Jake when he hugs him, pulling away all too soon, and Michael's left looking at the glowing outline of Jake caused by the sun, and his heart turns to putty.

“Hey,” Jake greets, and Michael really is done for if this is how he gets over the boy simply greeting him in the morning.

Oh, and don't even get Michael started on Halloween.

He absolutely  _ adores  _ horror movies. Jeremy always got sick to his stomach or really freaked out by them, so Michael usually had his October horror movie marathon either by himself or with his mom. He could just sit for hours, wrapped up in dumb choices, gory deaths, and interesting stories.

This year, he sets up camp on a Saturday in October, switching on the living room television and booting up the DVD player. He throws a bag of popcorn in the microwave and listens to the faint popping as he looks through the large and growing collection of horror movies.

(His mom had to work late that night. He understood that, but… it still sucked.)

Knocks on the door echo through the house as he's pulling out the popcorn, and Michael tries to push down the annoyed feeling as he goes to answer it. Apparently, he was so annoyed that he didn't even to bother to look through the window before swinging the door open.

“Hello?” Michael asks as the door opens, ready to get this exchange done and over with. He had a date with Pennywise, and he wasn't about to stand him up.

Okay, so, maybe he can and will stand Pennywise up when he gets a look at who's standing at his door, arm still raised to knock.

“Hey, Mikey-o!” Jake greets, and Michael smiles slightly at the nickname. He leans against the door frame and crosses his arms. “What's crackin’?”

“I think I should ask you what's crackin’, considering you're on my porch,” Michael jokes, and Jake's face flushes a little. Michael's brain decides to remind him that he's only in ghost boxers and a black t-shirt. Goddammit.

“Oh, right! Well, I wanted to know if you wanted to hang or something?” Jake's fiddling with the sleeve of his jacket. “Just the… just the two of us?”

Through the mental screaming that is Michael's brain freaking out, he points a thumb behind himself. “I was just about to marathon horror movies, if you wanted to join me?”

A slow easy grin makes its way across Jake's face as he saunters in, taking off his jacket and hanging it on the coat rack. After Michael calms himself down, he walks into the kitchen and then throws in another bag of popcorn, dumping the first into a bowl.

“I love horror movies, though I still do jump a lot,” Jake admits, following him into the kitchen. “So don't be surprised if I, I don't know, start clinging onto your arm or something.”

Michael nearly burns himself on the bag as he pulls it out of the microwave, laughing awkwardly and wishing he could call Jeremy so that he could just scream into the receiver, but unfortunately, that wasn't proper etiquette for when you had a guest over.

Dumping the bag into the same bowl, he picks it up and gestures with his head for Jake to follow him. He puts the bowl in the middle of the couch, getting waters for the two of them, and then starting the movie.

“ _ It _ ?”

“Don't knock  _ It _ , okay? My dad introduced me to horror movies with this movie, it's a tradition.”

“... Seems a little intense for your first movie.”

Michael laughs, grabbing a handful of popcorn, easily melting into the couch. So what that there was a boy he was head over heels in love with on his couch? This was his safe zone.

“Maybe that's why I'm the way I am,” he wonders aloud, and Jake laughs then too, lightly punching his arm before leaning back into the couch too and just watching.

The movie eventually ends, and Michael gets up to change it. He puts in  _ Jeepers Creepers  _ before sitting down again.

(If he was sitting closer to Jake this time, he wouldn't mention it.)

“When I was younger, and I saw this movie with my mom, she told me I called him ‘cool fishy man’,” Jake reveals and Michael inhaled popcorn and began choking on it. Jake, between laughs, pounds on his back. Eventually, the popcorn is dislodged, and Michael turns to face Jake with a laugh, covering up his embarrassment.

“You called him  _ what now?” _

“‘Cool fishy man’.” Jake tilts his head a grins. “Little Jake was just as dope as Jake now.”

“Shut up, you goof,” Michael says lightly swatting at him even though his heart is hammering.  _ I'm pretty sure I just flirted with him; that's flirting, right? _

The rest of the marathon goes pretty uneventful if you don’t count the time where Jake clings to Michael's arm during  _ 28 Days Later _ , or when Jake shyly asks to spend the night and Michael has to control himself from shouting “yes!”.

(He totally screamed into his phone when he called Jeremy a few minutes after Jake left the next day, though.)

Michael just… really loves the fall. A lot of his favorite activities and events happen during the pretty confines of autumn, and no other season could compare.

That's alike to Jake Dillinger.

Loving somebody the way that he loves Jake used to be such a foreign concept to him.

Looking at it now, that's alike to whenever he'd say his favorite season is fall: typically it was either summer or winter, two extremes, and never the seasons between, but he'd recognize fall for its beauty. People admire and look up to Jake, wanting to get with him or be him, but underneath everything, there's just another sincere boy who deserves as much love as the fall, but never gets enough.

Michael would provide him with enough, even if it killed him from broken heart in the long run.

He just loved the fall and Jake way too much.


End file.
